Part 1 (2/2)

”The 'osses is tired, ma'am, no doubt, an' a long tras.h.i.+ng day it's been for 'osses; but, bless ye, Ganymede, he won't take no notice; he'll have his head in the manger soon as ever his girths is slacked, and they're both of 'em as sound as when they left the stable. Ah! we've much to be thankful for, we have! but how you're to get to the station, ma'am, without a ducking--that's wot beats me!”

”I must take my ducking, I suppose, James, and make the best of it,”

she answered, pleasantly; ”but it's going to be a fearful night. It comes on worse every minute.”

James, who had dropped back a horse's length, now pressed eagerly forward.

”I hear wheels, ma'am,” said he, ”and it's a'most a living certainty as they're going our way. If it was me, I'd make so bold as ask for a lift inside. Ganymede, he'll lead like a child, and you'll have all the more time to--to--s.h.i.+ft yerself, ma'am, afore the train be due.”

While he spoke, a one-horse fly, with luggage on the top, halted at her side, a window was let down, and a pleasant woman's voice from within proffered, to the benighted lady on horseback, any accommodation in the power of the occupant to bestow.

It was already too dark to distinguish faces; but the stranger's tones were courteous and winning. Mrs. Lascelles had no hesitation in availing herself of so opportune a shelter. The flyman was off his box in a twinkling, the lady leaped as quickly to the ground, James signified his approval, Ganymede gave himself a shake, and in another minute Mrs.

Lascelles found herself jerking, jolting, and jingling towards the station by the side of a perfect stranger, whose features, in the increasing obscurity, she strove vainly to make out.

Some indefinable instinct suggested to her, however, that her companion was young and pretty. A certain subtle fragrance which may or may not be the result of scents and essences, but which seems indigenous to all taking women, pervaded her gloves, her hair, her gown, nay, the very winter jacket with which she defied the cold. The rustle of her dress as she made room, the touch of her hand as she took sundry wraps from the front seat of the carriage and heaped them in her guest's lap, told Mrs.

Lascelles that this errant damsel, wandering about in a hired fly through the rain, was one for whom lances had already been broken, and champions, it may be, laid gasping on the plain. For several seconds she racked her brains, wondering who and what the traveller could be, where coming from, where going to, why she had never met, nor heard of her before.

It was not to be expected that silence between these two ladies should last long. Cross-examining each other with great caution and politeness, they presently discovered that they were both bound for London, and by the same train. This coincidence involved, no doubt, a feeling of sisterhood and mutual confidence; yet the coloured lights of the station were already visible, and the fly was turning into its gravelled area, ere Mrs. Lascelles could divine with any certainty the place her companion had lately quitted.

”What a long drive it is, to be sure!” observed the latter wearily. ”And they call it only five miles to Midcombe Junction from Blackgrove!”

Mrs. Lascelles felt her heart give a jump, and she caught her breath.

”From Blackgrove!” she repeated. ”Do you know Sir Henry Hallaton?”

”I _do_ know Sir Henry,” replied the other with emphasis. ”I know him thoroughly!”

CHAPTER II.

AN ALLIANCE.

In the boudoir of a dear little house, just far enough off Piccadilly to be out of the roar of its carriages, sat Mrs. Lascelles, ”waiting luncheon,” as she called it, for her travelling companion of the day before.

The ladies had been so charmed with each other in their railway journey the previous evening, that an invitation to the pleasantest of all meals was given, and accepted with great cordiality, before they parted; and the mistress of No. 40, as she loved to designate it, was glad to think that her pretty home should look its best for the reception of this new friend. A canary was perched in the window, a fire blazed in the grate, a pug-dog was snoring happily on the rug, a bullfinch swelling in splendid sulks on the work-table: with a peal at the door bell this simple machinery seemed all set in motion at once--the canary twittered, the pug barked, the bullfinch subsided, Mrs. Lascelles jumped up, the door opened, and a footman announced ”Miss Ross!”

If Miss Ross looked well under the dim light of a railway carriage, she lost nothing of her prestige when exposed to the full glare of day. She was pale, certainly, and perhaps a little too thin, but her black eyes were certainly splendid; while over her rather irregular features and her too resolute mouth and chin was cast a wild, mournful expression, half pathetic, half defiant, expressly calculated, it would seem, for the subjugation of mankind, especially that portion who have outlived the fresher and more healthy tastes of youth; add to this, ma.s.ses of black hair, a little bonnet with a scarlet flower, a graceful figure, lithe as a panther's, clad in a dark but very becoming dress, and I submit that the general effect of such an arrival fully justified the disturbance it created in the boudoir at No. 40.

Mrs. Lascelles, it is needless to observe, took in all these details at a glance,--she had ”reckoned up” her visitor, as the Yankees say, long before she let go the hands she clasped in both her own with so cordial a welcome.

”This woman,” thought she, ”would be a formidable enemy. I wonder whether she might not also prove a valuable friend.”

Then, sharp and cold, shot through her the misgiving of the day before; what had she been doing at Blackgrove, this dark-eyed girl, and what did she know of Sir Henry Hallaton? No stone would she leave unturned till she found out.

Miss Ross, however, did not seem at all a mysterious person, at least on the surface.

Before she had taken off her bonnet and made friends with the pug, she had already broached the subject nearest the other's heart.

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